In Dying to Work, Jonathan Karmel raises our awareness of unsafe working conditions with accounts of workers who were needlessly injured or killed on the job. Based on heart-wrenching interviews Karmel conducted with injured workers and surviving family members across the country, the stories in this book are introduced in a way that helps place them in a historical and political context and represent a wide survey of the American workplace, including, among others, warehouse workers, grocery store clerks, hotel housekeepers, and river dredgers.

Karmel’s examples are portraits of the lives and dreams cut short and reports of the workplace incidents that tragically changed the lives of everyone around them. Dying to Work includes incidents from industries and jobs that we do not commonly associate with injuries and fatalities and highlights the risks faced by workers who are hidden in plain view all around us. While exposing the failure of safety laws that leave millions of workers without compensation and employers without any meaningful incentive to protect their workers, Karmel offers the reader some hope in the form of policy suggestions that may make American workers safer and employers more accountable. This is a book for anyone interested in issues of worker health and safety, and it will also serve as the cornerstone for courses in public policy, community health, labor studies, business ethics, regulation and safety, and occupational and environmental health policy.

PrefaceIntroduction1. America Goes to Work2. The Torch That Lighted Up the Industrial Scene3. Keeping Americans Safe at Work4. Just the Facts5. Stories6. What Can We Do?7. Are There Really Any Accidents?EpilogueNotesIndex

Dying to Work

"The book to read if you want to know what’s happening with worker health and safety in these difficult times."

- Labor Notes

Dying to Work

"Most interestingly... the book features a collection of stories about workers who were killed or injured on the job. As one might expect, there are subsections devoted to risks of being an electrician, logger, oil & gas worker and coal miner, with corresponding horror stories for each occupation. But it’s the personal experiences of grocery clerks and hotel housekeepers—two other surprisingly high-risk occupations—that are the real page-turners."

- Failure Magazine

Dying to Work

"[Karmel] directs our attention toward an awareness of a hidden-in-plain-sight problem, where instead of provoking outrage and indignation, death and injury on the job are considered to be a condition of doing business and a necessary evil in the production process.... Karmel argues effectively for changing that narrative.... [Dying to Work] is a call to action."

- New Solutions

Dying to Work

"[Dying to Work] highlights how corporations have simply not placed a premium on protecting their workers from harm."

- Emory Corporate Governance and Accountability Review

Dying to Work

"Karmel has written a gripping and disturbing book on the state of safety and health in the workplace. He has compiled a revealing series of personal accounts of workplace accidents. The cumulative impact is painful."

- Choice

Dying to Work

"A compelling call for action on a national health crisis that's hiding in plain sight."

- Unionist

Dying to Work

"In Dying to Work, Jonathan D. Karmel presents issues faced by workers in a full range of industries, many of which the general public doesn’t typically think of as hazardous. Using the powerful stories of individual fatality and injury cases is an effective way to introduce each worker health and safety topic."

- Celeste Monforton, Professorial Lecturer at the Milken Institute School of Public Health, The George Washington University

Dying to Work

"Dying to Work offers readable, powerful human stories of workplace injuries and illnesses. Jonathan D. Karmel also offers well-presented arguments for addressing the issues and preventing like tragedies."